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She doesn't have the strength to move, after he leaves. Instead, she just lights a cigarette and slides down the wall when her knees give out. She could probably still see the distant glimpse of the Swordfish if she tried, so she doesn't look. "Maybe I'll just stay here forever," she murmurs.
"Do you mean here on the ship, or there on the floor?" Jet's smiling, for some reason, holding out a hand.
Faye shrugs. "Does it matter?" She takes his hand, and he pulls her to her feet.
"I put a tracking device on his ship," Jet says instead of answering. "I'm going after him."
Faye's grip tightens involuntarily. "He's dead."
"Probably."
"He deserves to die, after what he did to us."
"I know."
"We deserve better than to have him alive."
"I agree."
"Then why--?"
He smiles, but his eyes are sad. "I want to bury his body," he says in the most broken voice Faye has ever heard.
She yanks her hand away. "Fine," she snaps, stalking off towards the cabin. She pauses in the doorway, though, and turns. "If he's still alive when we get there, I'm shooting him myself."
Jet salutes her. "I'll hand you the gun."
When they realize he'd gone into the Syndicate itself, they expect that they'll have to fight their way to wherever he is. They pass through easily, though. Bodies lie everywhere along their way, and the living barely take notice of them. A woman is sobbing over a bloody corpse; men everywhere look lost, haunted.
Faye grabs one of them. "Hey, you! What the hell happened here?"
"Vicious is dead," he says. "We don't know what to do, anymore."
"Who gives a shit about Vicious!" she screams into his infuriatingly passive eyes. "Where's Spike!?" She shakes him furiously, until Jet rests a hand on her shoulder.
The man points upward. "Up there."
No way, he'd go to hell, Faye thinks furiously.
"Top floor, then," Jet says calmly.
They find him on the stairs, face down in a pile of blood. Faye sits next to him, flips him over so he's lying across her lap. "I hate this," she says, refusing to look at Jet, who she knows is crying above them. "We shouldn't have bothered." She rests a hand on his chest. Over his heart. His cold, dead heart; one that had never beaten for her, and now never would. His heart belonged to Julia, and now that she was gone so was he. Idiot, she thinks, and is about to repeat aloud when she feels something flutter beneath her fingers.
And then, it flutters again.
Faye's eyes blow wide and she pulls his chest up to her ear by the lapels of his coat, listening:
Thump. Thump. Thump.
She shoves him off of her, and he slides down the stairs to Jet's surprised feet. "He's alive," she says quietly, her stinging eyes rising up to meet Jet's wide ones.
He's frozen for a moment, then he's leaning down to pick him up. "Bastard."
"He's been waking up, every now and then, the last couple of times I sat with him," Jet tells her, completely unwarranted. "You should sit with him, talk to him. Talk out your issues."
"You shouldn't have carried him back," Faye counters, flicking her lighter. "Should have let him die."
"If you really wanted that, you would have shot him yourself, like you said you would."
"You never handed me the gun."
Jet laughs. "Go visit him, or I'll kick you off my ship."
"You'd choose him over me?" she asks, tilting her head back over the edge of the couch to look at him the first time. He looks strange, upside down. He frowns, and it doesn't look anything like a smile. "Well, I guess that one was obvious," she admits.
She waits until it's dark out, until Jet's asleep, so that she doesn't have to watch herself do it. He's asleep when she slips in, and stays that way even when she slams the door behind her. She collapses into a chair in the corner--not the one next to the bed, which probably has an imprint of Jet's ass on it. The clock ticks.
"...You were supposed to be dead," she says, finally. She stands up angrily. "Damn it, you bastard, you can't even die properly! How dare you, how dare you survive, Spike Spiegel. Do you know how much we cared, how much I cared? You don't have the right to survive, you can't be here, being all... you, and making me care again, when you already left! You already left us behind, you don't get to come back from that! You made your damn choice the second you heard her name, so damn well stick to it and die, Spike Spiegel!" Somewhere along her tirade, she crawled onto his bed, hovered over him, jammed a finger in front of his face.
It's dark, so she doesn't notice when his hand slowly rises to gently grab her pointed hand, gently pulling it down to rest at his side, his bandaged hand lying atop the back of her closed fist. (Her breath hitches despite itself; her eyes are blown wide; something wet forms in the corner of her eye.) He lifts his other hand to where she can see it and crooks a finger, beckoning; she leans forward as if she's in a dream, until her ear is inches away from his mouth.
"Sorry," he says in a quiet, raspy, unused voice, and she watches as a tear falls from her cheek to his pillow.
"Not," she says finally, swallowing when her voice cracks, "Not good enough." She yanks her hand out from under his, climbs off of his bed, and slams the door behind her when she leaves. Her back is a dull thud against the door soon after.
It seems like no time at all passes before he's up and talking again, doing his stupid shirtless stretches every morning and bantering with Jet all the time. He's just constantly There, and Jet is over the moon about it, even through his gruff facade, so Faye doesn't get any sympathy there. Ed and Ein are gone still too, have been since before it all went down, so Faye is mostly left to just sulk in her own self-pity, doing her best to avoid the only people who ever made her feel like she belonged. It really is better to be lonely by yourself, she remembers bitterly. I should have known better than to come back. She won't ever leave again, though, not after lying alone in the dirt where her bed used to be. She hates it, but they're all she has, all she'll ever have again. She can't leave the BeBop, so she suffers in silence.
Well. Mostly in silence.
"Don't you think women are too complicated and moody for their own good, Jet?" Spike asks loudly, one day, staring straight at Faye.
"Don't drag me into this," Jet laments, scrolling through bounties.
"Tell me, Spike, do you have a death wish?" Faye grumbles, clipping the nail off her ring finger with a satisfying snap.
He flops down on the couch next to her, throwing an arm over the back deliberately behind her shoulders. He's smiling that damnable smile, the one that hadn't left his face since he woke up fully; a selfish, egoistic, self-satisfied cheshire grin. "Not anymore. I had my brush with death and came back alive, so it's official. Spike Spiegel is going to live forever!" She glares at him, and he winks.
"Whatever happens, happens, is that right?" she quips.
He twirls a finger through her hair. "Whatever happens, happens," he flirts.
She smiles brightly. "You chose her the second you left when I asked you not to. Don't fucking touch me."
She feels a brief sense of satisfaction when his smile falls, though it fades as the light in his eyes does. "Sorry," he grunts, and moves to peer over Jet's shoulder instead. "What do we have, Jet?"
Jet side-eyes the two of them before responding. "A woman on Ganymede who allegedly murdered a woman that her husband slept with. Goes by the name Mika Harima, apparently."
"My kind of woman," Spike and Faye say in unison. Spike snorts. Faye glares. Jet's temple twitches.
"I'm sending the two of you after her on your own. Don't screw it up. And, while you're at it, fix this shitty atmosphere too, I can't stand to be around either of you."
"Part of the job is proving that Harima really did kill somebody, and had the intent to," Jet had explained back on the ship. That's half the reason Faye is currently sidled up to and flirting with Seiji Yagiri. (The other half is that she wants to see if it'll make Spike's skin crawl.)
"You know, Seiji, you're quite the handsome man," Faye says, her tongue feeling as silky smooth as the tie she's running her fingers down. "Surely you must be taken already--or am I wrong?"
"He is," Harima butts in icily, latching herself onto Yagiri's arm.
"You're quite pretty yourself, though, Miss Valentine," Yagiri adds smoothly. "Maybe we can still work something out." He laughs, and Faye does too, leaning against his shoulder. The look Harima gives her is downright murderous, so Faye brushes her hair behind her ear, subtly flicking on the audio recorder on her headband as she does so.
"Well," Faye says, straightening up, "I think I need a smoke. But I'll catch you later, darling," she says, blowing a little kiss.
She heads outside and waits in the dark alley patiently. "You did good," Spike's tinny voice yaps into her earpiece, "She's on her way out."
"Did you really expect anything less?" Faye wonders. She smiles as she hears footsteps, and soon there is a knife at her throat.
"You're going to die for this," Harima hisses into her ear. "You should have left my Seiji alone!"
Spike emerges from the shadows and grabs Harima's wrist, quickly wrapping her arm into a lock. "Is that all it takes?" he wonders. "I've done far worse, and I'm still alive."
Faye snorts. "Damn right you have. We're turning you in, honey bunch, there's a bounty on your head."
Harima's eyes blow wide. "You--there's no proof!"
Faye taps her headband. "Audio recording, sweetie, and we're taking that knife you just gave us too. I bet it's the same one you used to kill that other girl."
"How unoriginal," Spike scoffs, "Though I suppose you get points for such a personal murder."
"It's not personal, she'll stab any whore in the street."
"Well, she did try to kill you," Spike reasons.
"I'll kill you both!" Harima screams, struggling, and Faye glances pointedly at her.
"...Touche," he concedes.
"Oy." Spike lights a cigarette as he leans back against the railing Faye's been smoking over for about an hour.
She glares, but makes no sign of moving. "What do you want," she half-asks, half-complains, tired.
"A place to smoke," he says amiably.
"There's a whole ship for it."
He twists the cigarette between his fingers. "What do you want, Faye?"
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"It means," he says, leaning forward to shove his face uncomfortably close to hers, in a way that makes her knees tremble as she remembers a different conversation, the one she thought--she knew--would be their last, "I've been working my ass off trying to figure out what you want from me, because you've decided you hate me and, apparently, saying sorry isn't good enough."
Her breath catches. "Spike--"
He slams his hands against the railing on either side of her, trapping her. "Do you want to fight, forever? Argue back and forth, with real venom behind the words because you can't get over anything? Do you want--" he pulls one hand back to catch her fingers-- "to be friends, like before but more real, with promises and expectations and commitment, playing some game of house with Jet? Maybe we'll get Ed and Ein back, that'll liven things up!"
"Spike--!"
"Or maybe," he interrupts, slipping his other hand up to rest on her back (he snaps one of the straps lightly, and she shivers), "You want something a little more along the lines of this," he growls, and he envelops her mouth with his, his tongue pushing between her lips, quick and dirty; his eyes are closed, hers are blown wide, but she can't pull away, she could never really leave him--
He stops, after a moment, and his hands move back to the railing as he drops his forehead against her shoulder. "I can't do any of that, Faye. I expected--I wanted to die that day, as much as you wanted me to. I was never expecting to live longer than Julia--hell, living longer than Vicious is freaking me out. None of it feels real, so how can you expect me to, to apologize, to change, to stop loving her, and start living with you and Jet?"
Faye leans back against the railing and thinks long and hard about kicking him in the balls and yelling at him until she's blue in the face. It would be fun, and he deserves it, she reasons, but I suppose it wouldn't do either of us any good. "When did I say I wanted any of that?" she wonders aloud (she can see his back muscles tense). "Listen, Spike, I know you're a suicidal idiot. All I want is for the pain to go away, enough that we can be normal again. I'm not asking you to give up your past, I just don't want you to give up your present for the sake of it. You're living, now. She's not. Figure out how to deal with that and move on."
He straightens up a bit, slowly, like a cat stretching it's back. "I never knew how to live my life in the first place."
She tilts her head in a smirk. "Think of it as a challenge."
"I suppose I owe you another apology, too. I think I underestimated you."
"Most men do," she says, and blows smoke in his face. "Still not good enough, Spike Spiegel."
He chuckles. "Am I allowed to ask what is good enough?"
"Ask me again when you figure out if you're alive or not."
He was gone in the morning.
Two years later.
Faye and Jet sit reflected on either side of the coffee table, hunched over, elbows on their knees, contemplative. A screen between them is displaying the info on another bounty, one of the men trying to restart the Red Dragon syndicate. Chin something or other; probably brother to Shin and Lin and whoever else was in that unimaginative family.
"We have to get this one," Jet tells her.
"Obviously," she snaps. "We haven't had any good money in months."
"How do we get ahead of the assholes stealing our bounties?"
"Isn't it your job to do the thinking? I'm just here to do the grunt work, I thought we agreed."
He glares. "That doesn't mean you can't think of something."
Faye massages her temples. "I think we're wasting time. We should be outrunning them."
Jet snorts. "You think they haven't thought of that?"
"You got any better ideas?"
They're both silent for a moment; then, on some unspoken signal, they both jump to their feet (Jet moves to the BeBop's controls; Faye packs herself into the Red Tail).
"He's in a bar called the Dancing Lover," Jet tells her over the comms. "You remember what he looks like?"
"What kind of name is that?" Faye complains.
"It's a gay bar. Women will probably be in short supply, there."
She snorts. "So much for staying undercover."
"You were the one who wanted to rush out right away!"
There's all sorts of characters in the Dancing Lover (Faye has to laugh every time she reads the name): a man in full drag, a man in a giant sombrero and poncho, a man wearing nothing but assless pants. No women, obviously; she gets a few odd looks (though none quite so lecherous as she's used to--it's almost kind of nice). And then, at the end of the bar, with another man intimately in his lap, is Chin something or other: her target.
Faye saunters up to the bar stool next to them and orders a drink. "Evening, boys," she says, smiling as they break apart and look at her, annoyed.
"Something you need, miss?" Chin asks in a huff, with an odd emphasis on the "miss;" Faye bristles a bit.
"Actually, yes," she grins, reaching for her gun--
But before she can, the man in the comically large sombrero presses a gun to the side of Chin's head. "I'm afraid I'm turning you in, Chin," the man says. "Of course, I always liked your brothers more."
Chin stares at the man, eyes blown wide. "I can't believe it," he whispers. "You're alive? But, why--"
"Oh, fuck no!" Faye yells, pulling her gun on sombrero man. "He's my bounty, mine! Get the hell out!"
"How are you planning to transport him?" he wonders, and there's a grin in that voice, something familiar--
"Faye! Something's taking over our computers, get out of there--" Jet's voice crackles in her ear, before being cut off abruptly.
Faye grits her teeth. "What the hell did you do?! Who the fuck are you to, to steal our bounties like this--"
"Spiky, Spiky, Ed got the BeBop!" a familiar voice sing-songs as Ed jumps up on sombrero man's back. They look up and, seeing Faye, grin loudly. "Faye-Faye! Ed and Ein and Spike were looking for you! Lookie, lookie, Spiky, it's Faye-Faye! Faye-Faye and the BeBop!" She pulls the sombrero up, away from the man's face, revealing an exasperated Spike Spiegel.
"Yes, I know it's Faye. We're busy right now, Ed."
Faye's fists clench around her gun angrily. "Ed, distract Spike for me?"
"What--"
"Aye-aye, Faye-Faye!" Ed salutes and shoves the sombrero back over Spike's face, clambering all over him. Faye snaps cuffs over Chin's wrists and drags him out of the bar with her, quickly jumping into the Red Tail.
"Jet, I got the target, how's the BeBop?"
"Not looking good. Who the hell could do something like this?"
"Ed and Spike are the assholes stealing our bounties," Faye growls. Something barks from behind her seat, and she almost swerves into a building. "I think even the damn dog is back, actually." She glances behind her to see the Swordfish chasing close behind, with Ed and Spike grinning in the window.
"Shit, this is Ed's hacking, isn't it," Jet grumbles. "Should've known."
"Does it help to know that?"
"Helps me relax. I'll never get through this shit on my own."
Spike pops up on the proximity comms. "Give it up, Faye, we have the BeBop." ("Hi-hi, Faye-Faye! Is Ein with you?")
Faye switches off the proximity comms angrily. "You could just let me go," Chin suggests hopefully. "If you
can't turn me in yourself, wouldn't it be better if neither of you gets the money?"
"Ein, bite him," Faye snaps, satisfied when the resulting crunch and scream ensue. I'll just take him to the station myself, she decides, swerving around tight corners in an attempt to lose Spike.
At some point, Ed and Spike remember that they can remotely control her ship as well, not just the BeBop. They get the money.
"Faye-Faye, can Ed and Ein and Spike stay on the BeBop again?" Ed asks in their endearing way, in front of the station. Spike looks concerned.
Faye picks Ein up by the scruff and shoves him at Spike's face. "Take the dog and leave." (Ein barks.)
Spike takes the dog, but doesn't leave. "Ed really wants to go back to the BeBop."
Faye glances down. "Hmm? Weren't you going to look for your father?"
"Father-person is hard to find," Ed complains. "BeBop is more fun, BeBop, BeBop!"
Faye drums her fingers on Ed's head. "Fine. Ed, you can stay. You can bring the dog if you unlock the BeBop for us."
"Yay! BeBop, BeBop, hard luck, spaceship going up, up, up!"
"I'll meet you there, then?" Spike asks.
"Nope," Faye says, planting her feet and holding out her hand. "I want the bounty money. From all of the bounties you stole from us."
Spike winces. "Say it was a collaborative effort and split it 50/50?"
Faye spins around. "Come on, Ed, let's go."
"Wait! Damnit, woman! I'll give you the money, come on!"
Spike seeks her out that night, holds out a deck of cards like a peace offering. She takes it begrudgingly, starts to shuffle as he sits across from her.
"I suppose you know the way to Poker Alice's heart," Faye concedes. "What are we playing?"
"Something low stakes, please, I lost all my money today," he says with a placating grin.
"Gin, then," she decides, dealing out ten cards.
("Gin, Shin, Lin, Chin," Ed mumbles sleepily from the floor, and rolls over.)
"How have you been?"
Faye snorts. "Better off, without you. Where did you go?" (She's got sevens, fours, queens, tens, and the start of a run in hearts.)
"Finland."
"Do you think I'm stupid?"
"Among other places. Check the card box, though." Sure enough, a sticker proudly declares Made in Finland.
(They exchange a few cards. Faye quickly drops all her queens in favor of a four and a ten.)
"Why did you come back?"
"Would you believe it if I said I missed it here?"
"No."
"Shame. Ed talked me into it."
(She swaps a seven for a heart.)
"You seem...livelier."
"I suppose. Kids and dogs do that to you, unfortunately."
Faye draws her last heart from the deck and puts her seven face down. "Gin," she announces, and they lay out their cards.
"You had my last heart," Spike points out.
Faye checks their hands. "There's no hearts in your hand..."
She trails off, because he's not looking at the cards. His eyes lock on to hers, and he smiles, before standing. "I'm going to bed," he announces.
"Ah--your cards--" Faye startles, frantically gathering them together.
"Keep them," he waves off.
Her hands still, and she slumps back against the couch. She fidgets with the straps of her clothes. How dare he, she thinks, frowning as it doesn't hold the same venom that it used to. How dare he. No, that's not right either. "How dare he," she tries aloud.
"Dare, spare, Claire loves the moon," Ed echoes from the floor. "Spike loves Faye loves Spike, Ed and Ein and Jet love the BeBop. Kissy-kissy, kissy-kissy."
"I don't need your criticism," Faye snaps.
She's almost surprised when she finds him lying in her bed instead of his own; almost, but not quite, because she'd looked for him in his own room first. She sits next to him when he beckons; leans into his touch when he slides his fingers under the straps of her clothes. She reaches out, and the backs of her fingers stroke against the hard line of his jaw...
"Is this a dream, or reality?" she murmurs.
His fingers gently trace the curve of her thigh, from the sensitive tendon at the back of her knee to the hem of her shorts. "I've never been sure," he admits, picking at a loose string behind her thigh.
"If this is a dream," she whispers against the soft shell of his ear, "I think it might be a nightmare."
He pinches her thigh. "It's real, then," he decides. "If it were a dream, you would be much nicer to me."
"Really? So do you dream about me often?" Faye teases, pressing her thumb against his lower lip and gasping when he licks it.
"Only in my nightmares." He yanks her down and they meet; lips to lips, thighs to thighs, hips to hips, chest to chest, like magnets of opposite poles finally allowed to touch. They move, breathe, kiss, and...
Well. I think you know what happens next.
("Can I ask you something?"
"I mean, you just did, but sure."
"Asshole. If..."
"What?"
"Actually, I don't think I want to know the answer. Good night."
"...If she hadn't died, I always would have picked her."
"I said I didn't want to know. But thanks, I guess. What a fucking gentleman."
"You didn't let me finish."
"Really? What was that earlier, then?"
"Shut up for once, will you?"
"Fine, tell me, what else were you going to say?"
"If she came back today, I wouldn't follow her."
"Oh."
"Good enough?"
"I suppose."
Laugh. "Good night, Faye."
"...Good night, Spike."
They never quite acknowledge it, not really, not outright; despite their flashy personalities, neither are the type to share secrets, or even truths. Still, though, the air is a little clearer afterwards. Bickering turns to teasing, insults turn to flirting, rough shoves and harsh words turn to gentle touches and compliments just barely left unspoken. They spend mornings drinking coffee and smoking, her feet in his lap or his head in hers. They get along a little too well on the hunt, enough that Jet complains about the "stuffy atmosphere" for a completely different reason than before. They say their good nights in public, and then again in private (they think that no one else on the ship knows; they all do).
But no one minds, not really. Because everyone knows that Spike loves Faye Valentine, and Faye loves Spike Spiegel. It just took them a while to get there.